The Federal Aviation Administration ended fiscal year 2025 with 13,164 air traffic controllers — roughly 6% fewer than a decade earlier — while flights handled by the air traffic control system grew about 10% between fiscal 2015 and 2024, according to the Government Accountability Office. That capacity-demand gap is the backdrop against which US aviation is absorbing the effects of repeated federal funding lapses, and it frames the case for the Aviation Funding Stability Act of 2025 now before Congress.

The most recent shock was partial and located at the Department of Homeland Security rather than the FAA. That shutdown lasted 11 weeks, disrupted airport-facing agencies including the Transportation Security Administration, and ended on April 30 with legislation funding key agencies through September 30. By that point, more than 1,000 TSA officers had left the agency, according to Reuters. Congress had already approved full-year Department of Transportation funding earlier in the year, insulating the FAA itself — but the episode demonstrated that aviation remains exposed whenever airport-facing agencies get caught in separate budget fights.

A training pipeline measured in years

The structural problem sits in the controller workforce. The FAA's 2023 National Airspace System Safety Review Team documented how the 2013 sequestration cuts and the 16-day shutdown suspended controller hiring for 10 months, with training suspended during the shutdown itself. The 2018-19 partial shutdown again halted hiring and training, followed by a four-month closure of the FAA training academy and an eight-month pandemic-era training pause. The cumulative effect: hiring stopped for more than a year, and training was suspended for roughly two of the last ten years.

Recovering that lost time is inherently slow. Per the FAA's 2026-28 Air Traffic Controller Workforce Plan, certifying a new-hire controller can take more than two years, depending on facility complexity. As of April 2026, approximately 11,000 certified professional controllers were deployed across more than 300 FAA air traffic facilities, with about 4,000 additional controllers still in the training pipeline.

The FAA's hiring plan targets 2,200 new controllers in fiscal 2026, 2,300 in fiscal 2027 and 2,400 in fiscal 2028. The agency is expanding training partnerships with colleges and technical schools, improving graduate placement at the highest-need facilities, and deploying simulator-based training intended to cut new-controller training times by up to 27%. Even so, hiring does not convert directly into capacity: each new controller must still pass through academy training, facility training and certification, against attrition and standards that leave little margin for disruption. A funding lapse that delays start dates slows an already constrained pipeline at precisely the moment added capacity is needed.

Oversight functions do not run normally during lapses

Safety oversight is similarly exposed. During the 2018-19 shutdown, the FAA recalled furloughed employees for safety-related functions including airman medical certifications, evaluations, audits, inspections and safety certification activities. Essential work continued, but not at normal tempo. The longer a lapse runs, the more pressure falls on FAA personnel, airports and aviation businesses to manage risk, prevent backlogs and hold critical certification and inspection timelines — time airport sponsors otherwise spend advancing safety, security and infrastructure projects.

General aviation feels the effects early: postponed projects, disrupted oversight, and uncertainty around leases, capital improvements and operational investments. For businesses that depend on predictable federal inspection schedules and approvals, a lapse erodes planning confidence.

Cost recovery pushes toward higher user fees

Budget instability also carries financial consequences for airport economics. Airports carry significant fixed and capital costs tied to safety, security, airfield maintenance, staffing and infrastructure. When activity shifts or costs rise, sponsors manage the gap through budgets, rates and fees — and a growing number are examining landing fees and other user charges as part of the cost-recovery equation. Those charges land on tenants, users and operators already absorbing higher costs for labor, insurance, fuel, maintenance and compliance, raising the cost of access to the national airspace system.

The legislative fix on the table

The Aviation Funding Stability Act of 2025 would provide continuing appropriations to the FAA from the Airport and Airway Trust Fund during a lapse, allowing programs, projects and activities funded in the prior fiscal year to continue for up to 30 days or until regular appropriations are enacted. For an industry in which controller certification alone runs past two years and the training pipeline holds 4,000 candidates, a 30-day bridge is a narrow buffer — but it would prevent the hiring and training suspensions that have repeatedly set the workforce back. Whether Congress enacts it before the next impasse will determine whether the FAA's 2,200-controller hiring target for fiscal 2026 stays on schedule.